New York (HedgeCo.Net) – James Simons, the founder of hedge fund Renaissance Technologies and his wife Marilyn Simons, both Ph.Ds, have decided to fund open access scientific repository arXiv through an operating grant from the Simons Foundation.

The arXiv preprint server at Cornell University Library in Ithaca, New York, will receive up to $350,000 a year in funding for the next five years. The sum would include a yearly $50,000 unconditional grant, with the remainder being matched to funds provided by arXiv’s other donors.

The Simons Foundation, which was founded in 1994 by the duo, conducts autism research and works to advance the frontiers of research in mathematics and the basic sciences.

“For me and for a large fraction of the active researchers in mathematics, physics and computer science, interaction with the arXiv is a daily practice. arXiv has changed the way we access information. This new resource is even more important for the many scientists who don’t have direct access to great libraries,” said David Eisenbud, Director of Mathematics and the Physical Sciences at the Simons Foundation.